Seeing Through the Flames
by ninmenju-shin
Summary: AU After a disease wipes out most of the population of Earth, cities are turned into families and things aren't as happy, or as sad, as they seem. A tale of betrayal, deciet, and friendship. Better summary soon
1. Legend of the Dark Fire

N/M Shin: Hey there y'all! Hasn't there just been a void in your lives while I was gone?

Zephyr: Yeah, I'm sure they've been holding their breath until you updated.

N/M Shin: ... But then they'd all be dead!

Jax: THEY WOULDN'T BE IF YOU'D GET OFF YOUR LAZY ASS ONCE IN AWHILE!

N/M Shin: Oh my God, THEY ARE DEAD! (Panics) Quick, get the difibu... the dufribah... THE SHOCKY THINGS WHERE YOU YELL "**CLEAR!"**

Jax: (Duck tapes N/M Shin to the wall) They're not dead!

N/M Shin: Oh, well then... As you may have noticed, this is a new fic, the old one is on... extended vacation. (Smiles)

Zephyr: Where was it before? You haven't updated it since the start of summer.

N/M Shin: WE DO NOT DWELL ON THE PAST!

I wanna keep this author's note short. My ANs have a habit of being extraordinarily long. Basically, every chapter will begin with a selection from a song, saying, or literary source that relates to the chapter. Why? Because I like it, and I write for myself, not anybody else. This will be a little more serious than my previous fics. Also, I have it completely planned out. The characters are set and I'm really excited about it. Where have I been? One word, "School." (Hisses rise from crowd) I swear, this entire year I haven't had a single night without at least an hour and a half of homework. But, good ole' Sonny Perdue, Georgia's own governor, has canceled school for Monday and Tuesday to conserve fuel on account of the hurricane scare in Texas. Four day weekend, maybe I'll get somethin' done! Seriously though, this hurricane stuff is bad, anything you can do to help should be done.

And all my buds in Texas, I hope y'all are doin' okay! (You know who you are.)

Zeph: ON TO ZEE FICCY!

**( ") The Legend of the Dark Fire (" )**

"_And I'm sure the view from heaven_

_Beats the hell out of mine here_

_And if we all believe in heaven_

_Maybe we'll make it through one more year_

_Down here."_

_-View from Heaven, Yellowcard_

In the short, fleeting moments right after a person has woken up, they deny their existence. Every morning, they wake from our dreams and, even though they hear their alarm clocks and see the sun through the window, they still cling to the dream they can now barely remember. Humans are imperfect, and no matter how perfect their life is, they feel that the dream is more pleasant than reality. That's why alarms have snooze buttons. How many times do you wake up every morning? Three, four, a number you can't remember? That's the sad thing, a few minutes later you have no idea what it was you were clinging so fiercely to.

Unfortunately, in these times, there is no snooze button; but humans are still as imperfect as ever.

"Y'all better be awake, cuz I been runnin' late this mornin' and y'all got more sleep than ya usually get! Oh yeah, it may not feel like it but y'all been sleepin' in an' it's time to get up! C'mon, it's a new day full 'o opportunities an' it looks a little nicer than it did yesterday mornin'! Course, that ain't an accurate observation, seein' as when I checked yesterday it was a 'lil earlier!"

"How much longer did we get to sleep, Vinny?"

"Bout eight minutes, I reckon, why?"

A chorus of groans rose from the street and a girl of about seventeen rolled out of her bed and onto the cold floor. The harsh slap of flesh on stone usually woke her up, but when that failed she had other ways of rising to greet the day.

_One, two, three, four... _She counted to thirty in her head until she was sure that all hints sleep had left her. She placed her palms flat on the ground and pushed up from the warm spot that had formed under her. Sometimes it took an iron will to get up in the morning.

"C'mon, c'mon, y'all got to sleep in an' that's all well an' good but ya need to get up now an' I ain't gonna shut up 'till you're all up an' at'em!"

The girl smiled and got dressed, a simple gray T-shirt featuring some long-gone school mascot and a baggy pear of blue jeans, then took her rightful place at the cold steel chair by her window to hear Vinny's morning "preaching."

Vinny was an odd character that woke every morning at exactly eight 'o clock, took his place at the corner of Main Street and St. Andrews, and provided everyone with a wake-up call they could neither curse nor ignore. No one was willing to waste electricity on alarm clocks, since you can't read the time while you're asleep anyway, and wind-up clocks worked fine if there was at least one that was always kept wound. Truthfully, it was Vinny's stories that everyone got up for. Vinny had a way of telling stories that everyone knew, but said them in such a strange way that no one knew what the hell he was rattling on about. No one knew when he thought of the stories or if he even ever slept, but the entire town relied on him for one reason or another.

When Vinny got to the corner from wherever it was he lived there was always a dark green bottle of his favorite beer waiting for him. Vic owned the only tavern in the city, and everyone walked through his door at one time or another. It just so happens that Vic's tavern is conveniently located on the same corner that Vinny occupies every morning, noon, and night. The only person that wakes up before Vinny is Vic, because he not only needs to set out Vinny's drink, but do his morning routine and get the tavern ready for the mob of people that congregated there every day too. How Vic woke up on his own was beyond anyone's knowledge, but no one was complaining. When Vinny was being particularly strange or powerful in his speeches, people would walk in and holler to Vic at the bar, "I'll have what Vinny's havin'!"

Vic always replies with, "We don't need another damn Vinny!"

"Today I'm gonna be straight forward with y'all," there was a pause as Vinny took a swig of his drink, "I'm not gonna tell my usual stories, cuz today's a special day! Maybe now you'll understand on your own, 'stead of consultin' the 'higher intelligence."

Her eyes widened, then returned to their normal size as she gave a subtle smile. "...Interesting," She whispered to herself.

Vinny's little speeches were usually transformed to obscure metaphors, with incomplete sentences and little bit of poetry thrown in. Sometimes even his thick accent was hard to understand.

The muffled sounds of people herding into the bar echoed into the room from the lower floor and she knew the story was about to start.

You see Vic's tavern has two stories, the bar and his house, and this young lady was graciously allotted a room there. There were three, and the remaining room was used for storage and as an office. There was also a kitchen and a bathroom, for obvious reasons.

Since Vinny's stories had clever metaphors and deep, hidden meanings, only a well-educated person could really understand them. And every morning, after Vinny's first "sermon," the only well-educated person in the city descended the stairs from her room to Vic's bar, and explained anything to the owner and landlord that he didn't understand.

Of course, since everyone herded into the bar in the morning, she was basically explaining it to everyone.

_If Vinny's gonna be straight forward today, what am I going to do this morning? _The girl chuckled in spite of herself.

The sounds from the bar downstairs became deathly silent as Vinny began to speak.

"People, today's more special than most. Maybe it ain't exactly a good special, but it's special, believe me. Today, as of this mornin', it's been five summers, five winters, five springs and falls, that's five years y'all, since the world got a whole lot emptier."

The girl's lips parted briefly in surprise and a small tremor ran up her spine. The silence downstairs went from light-hearted interest to melancholy. The gravity in the building became uncomfortable and the stale air caught in people's throats. Still, no one, not even those trembling in their chairs or from their place on the floor, broke the silence as Vinny continued.

"It's a story we all know and love, err... I mean hate, but I feel like we all need ta hear it. Sometimes we need ta 'member it an' sober up a 'lil. They did'n die ta be forgotten."

The air was choked with sorrow and an uncomfortable heat, but Vinny went on regardless. A few people nodded, agreeing that it needed to be told.

Vinny took a prolonged gulp of his drink, during which no one breathed, then continued.

"Nobody knows quite how it happened, but everybody knows it did. A disease, a virus, the tiniest of foes came along one day an' suddenly people in the street were droppin' like a sumo wrestler wit' no parachute. Millions, billions of people; ninety-seven percent of the whole world from what I heard, were dead an' gone, but some were perfectly fine. Some o' the some thought maybe they'd die later, so they lived it up an' then committed suicide. Others thought they were chosen by God or some shit like that," Vinny's voice cracked for an instant, and the girl thought she knew what happened to his loved ones.

He was silent for a moment longer, then continued, "An' they waited alone in a church 'spectin' a message from the Lord 'till they starved." He sighed, "Still, others thought they'd become immortal an' proved 'emselves wrong soon enough."

"So, another percent left the livin' world outta plain stupidness!" He took another sip. "So, eventually, our smartest scientists figured it out. 'Parently, some humans are born wit' a genetic defect called 'Mettron Deficiency." Most humans are born wit' 'lil critters in their blood called mettrons, but a small percent, three percent to be exact, aren't. Everybody alive in this city today don't got any mettrons, and y'all should be grateful fer it. It did'n really matter when they were discovered, cuz mettrons basically float around 'till they die an' don't do a damn thing all their lives. But, the disease, what would later be called the Dark Fire, got the mettrons all riled up and they started attackin' anythin' the blood touches. People's hearts was disintegrated 'fore they ever felt a thing!"

"So rest easy folks, they went real peaceful."

Vinny took one more sip, and then tossed his empty bottle into a trash can. But the can was so full that the bottle just bounced out and crashed to the pavement. "Hey Vic, I need a refill! Anyway, where was I? Eh, never mind, I'll keep goin' with a dry throat. After it took care o' all the mettrons, the Dark Fire made the air wet an' thick, then floated up inta the sky. So the disease not only endangered the human race, but blocked out most a' the sun 'till we couldn' tell when it was in the east er the west. Not only that, but any child born wit' mettrons died 'fore they had a chance to live. The Dark Fire was in the air their mothers breathed an' the food they ate. In the last five years, I reckon only two er three kids been born in the city." He paused to smile and wave at a pair of twins through the tavern window. "Yep, only two. Actually, since they was born at the same time, I might as well say one."

"But the Dark Fire wasn't done yet. Somethin' in the disease reacted wit' the pollution in the air an' started eatin' away at mortar in buildin's an' streets. For those o' you who don't know, mortar is the shit what holds bricks an' stones together. After a while, all o' the buildin's an' houses jus' fell apart. Only thin' what could stand after that was houses wit' wood an' nails and jus' plain steel buildin's. This ole warehouse what good ole Vic owns is made o' steel an' welded together. The floors are made o' concrete but at leas' it's got a roof. Didn't affect the street much, gravity holds it together fine." He stomped the ground for emphasis. "Most animals had mettrons too, an' now the weak been weeded out an' new species are runnin' 'round and raisin' hell. We got big, stocky deer wit' horns like a ram, we got rabbits as big as dogs wit' teeth like a lion, we even got big gray lizards the size o' tigers wit' long legs an' spiny tails an' they run so fast a Toyota couldn' get away from 'em. But they're vegetarians so we don' get too many problems from 'em. But wit' the disease cloggin' the air, we don' get birds no more. That's prob'ly what I miss the most, is the birds in the mornin', an' you two what been born after the Dark Fire never heard 'em at all. I'm sorry kids, they mighta been our 'lil piece o' heaven on earth."

Vinny stopped talking for a moment, and the silence only confirmed the absence of any beauty that could once be heard.

"An' then there's the one." Curses passed through barely open lips at the mention of his name. "One guy got the bright idea ta declare himself ruler o' what was left o' the world. He made up his own laws, an' they wasn't bad laws mind you, an' built up an' army o' soldiers. Technically they wasn't soldiers though, they was jus' his dogs."

The girl frowned and tightened her fist around a handful of her shirt. She didn't want to hear the rest of what he had to say, but knew she shouldn't go downstairs while Vinny was talking about it. With her teeth clenched, she continued to listen.

"The One already had an army, an' sent out a few of 'em to every city in the world. They came back wit' the strongest an' healthiest person they could find, an' then the One used all o' his science an' a 'lil bit o' magic..."

"An' he gave 'em ...powers. Magnificent powers, unstoppable powers what made their lives seem like they was worth livin'! Then he gave 'em a choice. You gotta understand, money's only got meanin' on a city-to-city scale. If a city's got money, they can buy stuff from other cities. That bein' said, a person who got paid made their city a better place to live. So these 'super people' got a choice. They could become police, and work full-time wit' a steady paycheck to hunt down people who was breakin' the rules, er they could be bountiers, an' get paid person-by-person to catch anybody the police couldn't. There was only one catch: to be a bountier, ya had to be stronger than a police officer. Most people hate these guys fer workin' fer the One, but they need ta understand they didn't really get as much choice as ya think they did."

"Y'all think they could choose neither after they got powers? Nope, anybody who refused the question got tortured inna way what suited 'em best. Life's hard fer all o' us and y'all shouldn't be makin' it worse fer anybody." Vinny looked up into the girl's window and she held his gaze until he turned back to the street.

"I know you guys think it's worse than hell an' you'd be better off dead, but think about it fer a sec; we've been livin' like this fer five years, five years y'all! That's why I told this story in the first place, cuz I ain't sad, I'm proud. Y'all should all be proud."

"...Just cuz we can't barely see no sun, don't mean it ain't there." Vinny sat down to show he was finished and for a moment it was completely silent, then, from the tavern downstairs came a rumble of noise.

Vinny looked surprised for a moment, then turned to them and took a bow.

He had never gotten applause before.

"_We're still chasing our tails_

_and the rising sun_

_And our dark water planet_

_Still spins in a race_

_where no one wins_

_and no one's one."_

_-The Beautiful Letdown, Switchfoot_

"Morning Rae, did you sleep well?" She was greeted by Vic at the bar as soon as she reached the bottom of the stairs.

"Pretty well, I did get an extra eight minutes, after all." Vic gave a wide grin and set a steaming mug on the bar.

"Well take your seat and drink your nasty herbal stuff, before the smell conks me out." Raven smiled and took a seat in the stool in front of her morning drink. "Jesus, that stuff is nasty. Can't just have a beer like everybody else..." Vic muttered as he brought another drink out to Vinny on the street, who was still taking his break.

Vic and Vinny were the only African Americans in the city, because mettrons are most common in black males. Caucasians had a slightly smaller percent with mettrons, and Asians had the least. Even then, most of every race was dead.

When Vic came back in Raven had finished her drink. "So was there anything you didn't understand this morning?" Raven asked him the same question every morning, then fetched his notepad from behind the bar where he wrote down things he didn't comprehend from Vinny's sermons. He had already gone through twelve, but when she pulled it from its drawer, there was nothing new written down.

"He was pretty straight forward today, wasn't he?" Vic plucked his notepad from her slender fingers and put it back into the drawer. He interlocked his fingers and, putting his elbows on the bar, placed them under his chin. "I guess he was right though, we needed to hear it."

"Yeah, it surprised me when he-"

"Good morning, Miss Raven!" Said girl looked around to see that the twins had seated themselves on either side of her.

"Oh, good morning Chris, good morning Tucker." Each boy smiled as she said their name, but while the former had a great, toothy grin, the latter only gave a slight smile.

The twins both had sandy blonde hair that hung just over their eyebrows, and looked almost identical except for their eyes. Tucker, the shy one, had bright lime green eyes, and Chris, the outgoing one, had dim brown eyes. The color of their eyes made their personalities look reversed. Chris and Tucker were the only children in the city born after the Dark Fire, and were exceptionally smart for five-years-olds.

"We have a question, don't we Tucker?" Chris was a good brother, and always encouraged his reserved twin to talk once in a while.

"Yeah, um, about what Vinny said." Tucker stared at the ground as he talked, and by the time he got to 'said' his voice was barely above a whisper.

"Yeah, he talked about those things that sounded pretty, what were they... breads?"

"Birds." Tucker corrected.

"Really? Are you sure Tucker? Cuz that sounds really weird."

"No, he's right, they were birds. What did want to know about them?" Tucker's head shot up and Chris's grin grew even wider.

"Everything, Miss Raven, we wanna know everything! What did they sound like, what did they look like, what did they eat? Did they have fur? Did they have claws? How did they stay in the sky? Could they really stay in the sky?"

Raven was surprised to find that it wasn't Chris, but Tucker that had posed all of these questions.

"Well, it would take a long time to explain everything..."

"We have time Miss Raven, please! Please, they sound so cool!" For once Chris and Tucker had the exact same expression on their faces. One of utmost curiosity and determination to make her talk by any means necessary.

She sighed in defeat and gave a weary smile. "Alright, come upstairs and I'll tell you all about them."

"Yes!" The twins jumped up and high-fived each other, then raced up the stairs to await their lesson.

Vic laughed. "Mighta bit off more than you can chew, Rae."

She smirked in his direction. "Sorry, I can't talk right now, my mouth is full."


	2. The Blind and the Angels

What's up y'all? I've only got a 60-day trial of MS word on my new LAPPYTOPPER so I gotta write **fast**.

Anyway, sorry for the long absence, sorry for getting your hopes up, sorry for missing your baseball game…yeah. I'll be updating now.

"Talking."

_Thinking…_

**Vinny's interruptions. **

**( ") The Blind and the Angels (" )**

"_From this second story window_

_I can hear the church bells calling out my name_

_This table is set for one_

_Even angels would be homesick_

_In this forsaken town."_

_-Unopened Letter to the World, The Ataris_

**"Time ta get up, up, up! C'mon y'all, it's a brand new day jus' like all o' the others so get the hell up and enjoy it! I'm not gonna shut up 'till I see all my favorite people up and at 'em! Come ta Vic's Tavern fer free coffee, beer, and shit like that!"**

"Thanks for the free advertising, Vinny."

**"Thanks fer the free beer, Vicky."**

"Don't call me that."

Raven woke up from a thin sleep and instantly regretted it. Apparently, she had fallen asleep in her metal folding chair.

"Jesus…" Raven barely whispered. Standing up, she put her hands on her hips and cracked her back, grimacing after hearing more than five pops. Standing up so fast, combined with arching her back, gave her a lightheaded feeling, and she waited a few seconds for it to pass.

After cracking her neck, which popped almost as many times as her back, Raven turned her gaze to the occupied bed on the far wall of her room. The twins were in a priceless position. Raven's pillow lay in the center of her bed, and the twin both had their heads buried deep into the white pillowcase. Their feet faced opposite ends of the bed; Tucker laid upside-down at the head and Chris had his feet against the baseboard.

Raven smiled and surveyed the rest of her room. Papers were scattered all over the floor, covered in sketches of talons, wings, and beaks. Books recovered from the library were strewn across the ground, their spines bending. A few open tomes displayed diagrams of birds in flight followed with a lengthy explanation at the bottom of the page. However, most were full of pictures, and it was these that the twins had visited the most.

It was very, **very **difficult explaining birds to someone who had never seen one. The most Raven could do to explain flight to the two eager boys was to teach them how to make paper airplanes. Of course, they insisted that she demonstrate flight personally. She knew she couldn't do that, and didn't hesitate to tell them so.

The teen stalked silently out of the room into the bathroom down the hall to start her morning routine. Once her hair was combed through and she was decked with a fresh pair of pants and a shirt, Raven strolled back into her room and began to pick the books and papers up off of the cement floor. One of the volumes tumbled from her arms and fell onto the concrete with a resonating **CRACK,** and the teen cringed at the loud noise._ Damn hardback…_ Tucker stirred and sat up.

The small boy lazily rubbed his eyes. "G'mornin' Miss Raven." Tucker stretched and looked around. "Sorry we took your bed."

"That's alright, I didn't mind." Raven's back ached from bending over to reach the books, and it reminded her of her "rude awakening" just a few moments ago.

Tucker, his green eyes clouded with sleep, shook his twin awake. After a great deal of yawning and stretching, both blondes were seated on the edge of the bed with their feet dangling over the side. Chris greeted his host much the same way as his brother and ran his fingers through his unruly hair.

"Well boys, we spent an entire day talking about birds, and I still don't think you understand at all."

"Yeah, well, I don't understand what feathers are at all. Your drawings looked like road kill."

Chris showed all of his teeth in a childish grin, but Tucker paled.

"Oh man, we've been gone all day and night? Marc's gonna kill us!" Tucker leapt from the bed and Chris's expression turned sober.

"Crap!"

Raven smiled. "Don't worry guys, I asked Vic to tell Marcus where you were right before I came upstairs."

"**Y'all are gonna hafta get your brains back in gear, cuz this mornin's story's gonna be just like all the rest! Get yourselves some coffee an' listen good!"**

Tucker fidgeted shortly before speaking. "Thank you for giving us your time, Miss Raven." She smiled at his lack of eye contact.

"Yeah, yeah! Birds sound so cool, I just wish I could see one fly! Could they really actually fly?" Raven gave an exaggerated groan and Chris laughed.

"But seriously, why can't you fly for us? Just a little? We won't tell anyone, please? I've never seen anything in the air but our paper airplanes!" Chris started off asking but his tone slowly turned demanding. "I know you can, Marc told me!"

The girl slowly turned to him and glared. "It's not that simple, Chris. Don't talk about things you don't understand."

Then, in a voice so quiet and close to his chest that Chris had to lean in to hear him, Tucker whispered. "I just wanna hear them sing…"

An uncomfortable silence followed, but was soon shattered by the "resident storyteller."

**"I ain't kiddin' y'all! Get some coffee real quick! Vic's stuff tastes like crap but it does the trick!"**

"Same to you, ya god-damned moocher!"

**"And speakin' o' which, where the hell's my beer!"**

Chris laughed and Tucker smiled. "Vinny's funny. Tucker says that when he gets a little older, he's gonna ask Vinny to teach him all about public speaking and stuff, and then he's gonna be the new storyteller guy!"

"Chris!" Tucker blushed and his brother laughed even harder.

"Chris, give him a break. I think it's a great idea Tucker." She ruffled his tawny hair and he presented a meek smile.

"Really?"

"Well, yeah." She took a seat beside him on the edge of the bed and wrapped an arm around his small shoulders. "You're not a very loud, outgoing-speaker type person, but you're willing to work on it. That's a really grown-up thing to do, Tucker. I'm proud of you!"

Chris scooted over to the girl's other side. "Miss Raven, am I grown up too?"

_Hmmm, how should I answer this? _"Ummm…" Raven stalled and put her remaining arm lovingly around Chris.

Chris furrowed his brow in a look of annoyance. "C'mon, am I?"

"Well…" Her mind rushed to find something to say. "I think you're-"

"Hey guys, wanna try some of my coffee? It'll help you get over your all-nighter!" Vic shouldered through the door with a tray of steaming mugs.

The corners of Raven's mouth turned up to transform her sigh of relief into a smile of gratitude. Vic's coffee had saved her from saying something she might regret. Raven's opinion was important to the twins, and she didn't want to lie to them, but Chris wasn't grown-up. _But he's five! He's not supposed to be grown-up!_

Thankfully, Chris abandoned his questioning to grab a mug from Vic. Raven began wondering how Chris knew about roadkill, since the streets were full of building wreckage and no one drove anymore. _Marcus probably pointed it out to them on his way to the factory one day._

Marcus Herron was not only the twins' big brother and guardian, but was also Raven's best friend. Marc had been Raven's best friend since third grade, and was one of the few people she could count on during her high school years when her father's chronic anger erupted into violence. She knew her father's warning signs, and often sought refuge at Marc's house until things quieted down. Their entire family made it through the Dark Fire, except their dad, but his mother died while she was in labor with the twins. Since then, Marcus had done his best to raise and take care of his little brothers, but he often avoided questions that they had about their mom.

Raven, on the other hand, took pleasure in the thought that her father had dropped dead and her weak mother had gone with him. Her mother was never beaten, because she was obedient and did everything her husband told her to do. She would just watch while he took out his belt or flashed his fists. Thinking about her mother made her sick sometimes.

Raven's grades in high school had been pathetically low, but only because she missed so many days. She was always out because she had 'fallen down the stairs' or 'twisted her ankle,' and her idiot teachers never got suspicious. Luckily, Marcus had most of the same classes, and would call to fill her in on what she missed.

Now, Marcus was the single most important person in the city. Marcus took special classes in high school, because he had always wanted to open his own home repair company. 'Things break all the time,' he would say, 'so I'll get paid all the time!' As it turned out, Marcus was now in charge of electricity, plumbing, and general repairs for the entire city. After the Dark Fire, too many people had died to run the main factory just north of the main part of the city, but Marcus had turned it into a one-man operation. He walked out there every day to check up on things, and afterwards would get his daily Sunkist from Vic. Sometimes he would bring the twins with him, and as a result they knew a lot about maintenance themselves.

People respected Marcus. They didn't respect her.

"Blech! This stuff's awful! Vic, how can you serve this?" Chris thrust his mug back at Vic, who placed it back on the tray.

"Yeah, Rae doesn't like it either." Vic handed her a mug of herbal tea, and she sipped it quietly.

"Oh yeah? Well I like it! I **really **like it! It's reallyreallyreally goooood!" Tucker gave his empty mug back to Vic and started drinking Chris's coffee.

Tucker started to giggle. "It makes me feel like I could fly! Oh it's sooo goooood!" Tucker's fast speech and loud voice made it obvious that he was hacked up on caffeine.

**"Okay, y'all can shut up now, cuz I'm startin'! Like I said, this's gonna be just like all the rest, so listen an' listen good!"**

Tucker stuck his head out of the window and shouted down at Vinny. "Hey Vinny, are you gonna talk about birds again? Huh, are yah? Cuz I learned all about 'em!"

Vinny raised an eyebrow. **"Well, that's either Chris, or Tucker's had his coffee. Anyway, I said to shut up, so y'all two just stay quiet an' listen!"**

Vic brought the empty mugs back downstairs, and the twins climbed back onto the bed to listen as Vinny began. Tucker, however, kept bouncing up and down on the mattress.

**"Alright y'all. After a fores' fire, all the trees is gone and the world, the heavens, and the hearts shine the dullest they ever shined. At first, all the things with eyes they cry. Later, the eyes search for somethin' else. Give it time, my friends with the gift of sight, the trees'll come back lookin' fer ya! The trees see you ain't there an' they got nobody ta talk to! The trees got memories they need refreshin' an' stories they gotta spew! Ya jus' gotta wait a 'lil while ta hear 'em."**

"**But see, withou' the trees the sightful grow wings an' fly away, past the dull black to the bright gold an' pearl, and they ain't a comin' back. I'm sorry folks but if there ain't nothin' to see the seers pack up an' leave."**

"**But that's when the blind come a nockin'. They been underground, the moles an' the worms, an' they never see no trees down in the dirt. Now, the trees just startin' ta grow back, an' ain't all that pretty yet, but whaddas a blind man care? What the sightless can do is listen, an' they hear the beautiful stories an' voices o' the trees an' beauty gets a new lease on life! The world's topsy-turvey and we're lovin' it! They's our trees now, an' we don't care how god-damned ugly they are, we like 'em!"**

"Well that was the most screwed up thing I've ever heard! Moles and trees, what does that have to do with anything?" Chris thought out loud.

"I kinda got some of it, I think…" Tucker stood up and headed towards the door.

"You would, mister 'All-Grown-up'." Chris grumbled and followed him.

Raven enjoyed the silence for a few moments.

_Well, I guess I have a job to do. _Raven never did like going downstairs. It wasn't peoples' comments that bothered her as much as their looks. She sauntered downstairs and into the crowded bar. Her stool was vacant, as always, and Vic was standing patiently behind the bar with his notepad in one hand and a pen in the other.

He was almost pathetic sometimes, but she kind of liked explaining things to him. If Marc was her best friend then Vic was her brother, and she didn't even know him before the Dark Fire. It's strange how disasters can bring some people together.

"_There's that girl again."_

"_Why can't she just leave? She doesn't deserve to be around normal people."_

"_What does Vic see in her?"_

"_Look at her hair, it's, like, purple!"_

"_If she wasn't Vic's friends I'd…"_

Raven could sense the negative emotions in the room before she heard their comments. It was sad, that these people depended on her so much but hated her with such a passion. It was prejudice in its most common form: Hating what you fear, fearing what you don't understand. And she could help that her hair was such a dark shade of violet. Just like she couldn't help the fact that she was shorter than most, or that her eyes naturally matched her short locks.

Raven's stool was like her refuge. People didn't bother her when she was with Vic.

"Well Rae, I'm confused beyond belief. I demand that you help me just like you do every morning."

"Sure…" She sat down with her elbows up on the bar and focused on the legs of her stool.

Vic took one look at her and knew what was wrong. "Don't let them bother you Rae, they're all asses. It's easier to hate someone than accept them, that's why they treat you like crap."

"I know. It doesn't bother me much anymore. So what didn't you get?"

"Alright," Vic glanced at his notepad, "I got that the forest fire was the Dark Fire, but what were the trees?"

Raven thought for a second. "Just the world I guess. The forest burning down must be like what happened to the world after the Dark Fire."

"That makes sense. Now make sense of the rest, cuz that's all I got."

"Okay, I guess that the seers would be people with mettrons, and the blind people would be people without mettrons, so flying away means dying. I don't get the gold and pearl thing though…"

"Heaven is supposed to have streets of gold and gates of pearl, or maybe it was the other way around, I don't remember. Haven't you ever read the bible?"

"We weren't much of a church family…"

Raven never told Vic about her family. She liked to think of the Dark Fire as a chance to start over. As far as Vic was concerned, she never had a family.

"So, why do the trees talk?" Vic was eager to get to the bottom of Vinny's story.

"Well, it basically means that the people living now live on earth, even though it isn't very pretty anymore. We appreciate what we have."

Vic seemed thoughtful for a moment, and then grew frustrated. "Well that's lame! We've been doing that for five frickin' years!"

"Actually, I think it's-"

Before Raven could finish, a man burst through the doors of the tavern. He looked to be a young adult, with dirty blond hair and blue eyes. His baggy, torn jeans, faded Led Zeppelin T-shirt, and five-o'clock shadow gave him the appearance of a stoner. As soon as he saw Raven he headed towards her.

"Marcus, what's wrong?" Raven got up out of her stool. It was too early for Marc to be back from the factory, and he looked frantic about something. Marcus was a tall, skinny guy, and towered over Raven as he approached her.

"Rae, there's a pack of foxxers over at Trey's. They're eating all the meat and he sent me to get you."

Trey was the city butcher. Any time someone managed to kill an animal, they would give it to Trey and he'd turn it into food. There wasn't much to do these days, so many people spent their days hunting. Most people brought in fighter deer, which had a lot of meat and were very numerous. Their horns also had many uses. It reminded Raven of how Native Americans used every part of the buffalo.

Striders were huge gray lizards. They could grow to the size of a tiger, and were very fast and intelligent. If striders weren't herbivores, everyone in the city would probably have been eaten already. Not only were these hard to shoot, but they only lived in the mountains. Their meat was tough but kept for a long time, and one strider had as much meat as five fighter deer. Only six striders were killed in the last five years. Raven had brought in four of them.

But Foxxers were a different story. Foxxers were about the size of a large cat, and were not only quick and agile, but armed with tiny serrated fangs and razor sharp claws. They traveled in packs, because all they ate was fighter deer and one couldn't bring them down alone. Foxxers were the only animals that wandered into the city, and often ransacked Trey's butcher shop when times were tough. One person didn't stand a chance against a pack of foxxers. People have been killed, and the scenes were gruesome.

"Alright, just let me get my gun and I'll head on over there." Raven hurried upstairs to her room and opened the top drawer of her nightstand.

But instead of pulling out a pistol or a rifle like the other hunters in the city, Raven pulled out an odd looking, futuristic weapon. She tested the guns aim and a red dot appeared on the wall. She smiled and tucked it into the back of her pants.

"Bountiers get the best weapons."

**( ") TBC (" )**

Okay. I'm not too sure about the quality of this chapter. It felt weird to write it, and I'm not sure if it made sense.

But seriously, I won't know unless you review!

Guys, 40 people get an email when I update. It's sad that only 4 reviewed last chapter. It's just sad.

So, until next time…

Jax: Hey wait! Me and Zeph didn't get any lines all chapter!

Read, review, repeat!

Jax: **DAMMIT!**


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